Concepts from Cognitive Psychology

1. Concepts from Cognitive Psychology • Levels of Processing: deep, surface, strategic • The deep approach is associated with: • intention of understanding what is to be learned • intrinsic motivation (interest in subject) • The surface approach is associated with: • reproducing what teachers desire • instrumental motivation or fear of failure • concerned primarily with memorization, not understanding • The strategic approach is associated with: • a combination of deep and surface strategies • a desire for highest possible grades • competitive form of motivation (need for achievement)

2. The Deep Approach • Focuses on “what is of significance” (i.e. teacher’s argument or the concepts applied to solving a problem). • Relates previous knowledge to new knowledge. • Relates knowledge from different courses. • Relates theoretical ideas to everyday experiences. • Relates and distinguish evidence and argument. • Organizes and structures content into a coherent whole.

3. The Surface Approach • Focuses “on the signs” (i.e. words and sentences of the text, or unthinkingly on the formula needed to solve a problem). • Focuses on unrelated parts of the task. • Memorizes information for assessments. • Associates facts and concepts unreflectively. • Fails to distinguish principles from examples. • Treats the task as an external imposition.

4. Deep or Surface Approach? “I suppose I’m trying to imagine what the experiment is talking about, in a physical sense, sort of get a picture of what it’s about. This one says an ultraviolet lamp emits one watt of power; it says calculate the energy falling on a square centimeter per second. I’m just thinking of the light and the way it spreads out, so therefore I know it’s the inverse-square law.”

5. Deep or Surface Approach? “You have got to go into the exam with as many formulae as possible. So you learn those parrot-fashion. And approaches to the way you work out problems, techniques involved in math, you know. I seem to remember these just sort of one day or two.”

6. Promoting Deep Approaches • emphasizing concepts over isolated facts • essay questions • problem solving • project reports • alternative/authentic assessments • no study guides • depth of coverage over breadth • clear explanations and challenging ideas • deal with relevant and interestingilize cooperative learning • high teacher expectations

7. Promoting Surface Approaches • using factually oriented short-answer or mutliple-choice questions • providing detailed study guides • breadth of coverage over depth • “spoon feeding” students • teaching to the test (IGAP for instance) • low teacher expectations

8. Deep or Surface Approach How will you teach? What effects will your teaching have?

9. Based on the following: • Entwistle, N. (1992). Student Learning and Study Strategies. In B. Clark & G. Neave (Eds.), The Encyclopedia of Higher Education, 3, New York: Pergamon Press. • Ramsden, P. (1992). Learning to Teach in Higher Education. New York: Routledge.